The World According to Bob

sellers being killed. There had been a case up in Norwich where two or three guys set about a vendor there and kicked him to death. I really didn’t want to add to the statistics.
    ‘Come on, Bob, let’s get out of here,’ I said, grabbing my stuff and heading off.
    I felt a mix of anger and despair. I was desperate for a change in my fortunes. I didn’t think I could take much more of this life. But, try as I might, I couldn’t see how on earth I was going to break free. Suddenly all that talk with my father of jobs and training seemed ridiculous, a complete pipe dream. Who was going to pay a recovering junkie a decent salary? Who was going to hire someone with a curriculum vitae as barren as the Australian outback where I spent part of my childhood? On that day, feeling as low as I did, the answer was as plain and bloody obvious as the nose on my face: no one.
     

Chapter 11
    Two Cool Cats
     
     
     
     
     
    One lunchtime in September 2010, I arrived at Angel tube to be greeted by Davika. She was a ticket attendant and had been one of our most loyal friends since Bob and I had started working in Islington. She often brought Bob a little treat or something to drink, especially during hot weather. Today, however, she simply wanted to deliver a message.
    ‘Hi James, there was someone here looking for you and Bob,’ she said. ‘He was a reporter from one of the local papers. He asked me to call him back if you were willing to talk to him.’
    ‘Really?’ I said. ‘I guess I don’t mind. Tell him he can come and see us during our regular hours.’
    It wasn’t the first time someone had paid us attention. There were a couple of films on the internet about Bob and I that had been viewed by a few thousand people and a couple of London bloggers had written nice things about us, but no one from the newspapers had shown any interest. To be honest, I took it with a pinch of salt. I’d had all sorts of weird and wonderful approaches over the years, 99 per cent of which came to nought.
    A couple of days later, however, I arrived at Angel to find this guy outside the tube station waiting for us.
    ‘Hi James, my name is Peter,’ he said. ‘I was wondering if I could do an interview with you for the Islington Tribune ?’
    ‘Sure, why not?’
    He proceeded to take a picture of Bob perched on my shoulder with the Angel tube station sign behind us. I felt a bit self-conscious. I hadn’t exactly dressed up for the occasion and was wearing a thick, early winter’s beard, but he seemed happy enough with the results.
    We then had a bit of a chat about my past and how we’d met. It wasn’t quite the Spanish inquisition, but it clearly gave him enough ammunition for his piece which he said would appear in the next edition of the Tribune . Again, I didn’t really take it too seriously. I worked on the principle that I’d believe it when I saw it. It was easier that way.
    It was a few days later on a Thursday morning, that Rita and Lee, the co-ordinators at The Big Issue stall on Islington Green called me over.
    ‘Hey James, you and Bob are in the paper today,’ Rita said, producing a copy of the Tribune .
    ‘Are we?’ I asked.
    Sure enough there was a half-page article on us written by Peter Gruner. The headline read:
     
    TWO COOL CATS . . .
    THE BIG ISSUE SELLER
    AND A STRAY CALLED BOB.
     
    The story began:
     
    Not since the legendary Dick Whittington has a man and his cat become such unlikely celebrities on the streets of Islington. The Big Issue seller James Bowen and his docile ginger cat Bob, who go everywhere together, have been attracting comments since they first appeared outside Angel Tube station. The story of how they met – widely reported in blogs on the internet – is one of such extraordinary pathos that it seems only a matter of time before we get a Hollywood film.
     
    I had to laugh out loud at some of the journalistic licence. Dick Whittington? Hollywood film? And I wasn’t terribly pleased with the way I looked in the photo, sporting that thick beard. But it was a lovely piece, I had to admit.
    I popped into the newsagent and grabbed a few copies to take home. Bob saw me looking at the piece again on the bus that evening and did a kind of double take. It didn’t happen very often, but for a split second he had this slightly baffled expression on his face. It was as if he was saying: ‘No, it can’t be. Can it? Really?’
    Plenty of people knew it was really us though. And the